I agree with B-Roy that the Blazers almost certainly would not adopt a "well, fuck Dame, he'll go wherever the hell we want to send him" attitude. That would create a black-hole of negative karma that Orlando trade looks like somebody just searched for the team with the best collection of draft picks and young players and then proposed the Magic send ALL those assets to Portland without a thought as to if Orlando would even consider mortgaging their future for the next decade to add a 31 year old PG on a super-max contract that is not the kind of return Portland will get if they trade Dame. It's going to be a whole lot less
The one about the Magic trade? I got it. You're saying the Blazers won't send Dame to a barren wasteland of talent (like the Magic) because of what he's done for the franchise. That's a valid take, and like I said, I can see that playing out in real life. It's the right PR move. It's not what's in the best interest of the franchise, though. If Dame is really so in his own feelings about not winning a championship after 9 years of telling everyone how important loyalty, and playing with his guys, and respecting other players' decisions was to the franchise, and just mere months of changing his mind and putting pressure on the org to win, he gets to live with the consequences. If you tell your spouse for 9 years that you love them no matter what they look like and them gaining a little weight here or there doesn't bother you, you don't get to get upset 6 months after you change your mind that they're not all of a sudden a super model. Dame is an amazing player and possibly even a better person and representative of the organization, don't get me wrong. But he's still just a part of the organization, one which will continue to exist well after he's traded or retires. A significant portion of our current situation is directly due to his frame of mind for the first 9 years of his career here. It's fine to change your mind and priorities, but adjusting to those changes takes time. If he can't accept that, then I don't think he deserves the right to give input on where he goes. JMO.
How is that any different from what we already have though? Free agents won't come here anyway. None of the marquee players ask to be traded here. We're already a black hole. Who cares at this point.
You also have to wonder about the leadership machinations that come with the decision to trade Dame. Very clearly, Neil is on the hot seat (feels like an understatement). If you trade Dame, you're pushing the reset button. Are you going to do that with the same GM who helped get us into this mess? Probably not. So if the decision is to trade Dame, don't you probably can Neil/hire his replacement first, to architect the rebuild? And if you're doing that, what incentive does a brand new employee have to do his job less than the best he can do to set himself up for success? I keep coming back to 1 specific thoughts with this whole thing... Neil absolutely deserves a lot of heat for why we are where we are. But where is the accountability for Dame and ownership? A more well-led organization would've fired Neil and figured out a way to satisfy Dame quite a while ago. What happens to Neil and Dame in the future, I think, will speak volumes about the ownership priorities going forward...
100% karma doesn't exist in the NBA anymore than loyalty does. What's the first thing every player says when they get traded? "At the end of the day, it's a business".
You could get 19, 21, and 32 THIS year. I wouldn't stay pat with that lineup, but it would be very deep, and give us some options going forward. You're right - getting rid of Dame makes almost no sense, unless we are going to let him ring chase and we rebuild. If we get rid of Dame, we are rebuilding. I would rather rebuild than stay pat. We need to get rid of either Dame or CJ, and none of the trades that have been bandied about are going to put us over the top, with the possible exception of CJ for Simmons, and I don't see that happening. This strategy would involve us getting younger and having a lot of young pieces in place - Barrett, Collins, Quickley, Simons, and Little and seeing which ones pan out. Barrett is gonna be a superstar. Collins is developing into an All-Star. Little and Simons have the physical talent. If one of them turns the corner, that would be gravy. Quickley is probably a complimentary piece, though. Yes, I would start Collins ahead of RoCo. Collins would be the future, not RoCo. Collins is going to be a perennial 20/10 guy, or close to it. Roco is never going to give you that production - he's more 12/6. Collins is a better shooter (both inside and out) and rebounder - by far. RoCo is a better defender, but Collins has the tools to be a good defender and an All-Star. RoCo is a solid complimentary piece, but you need All-stars around him, and the Blazers don't have that. I would want RoCo to mentor Collins and back up both Barrett and Collins to get starter minutes. We would need to make Nurk and Powell the complimentary pieces and CJ/Barrett/Collins the cornerstone. You could probably package RoCo and CJ for another All-star caliber player, if you aren't happy with CJ (Simmons or Paul George?) Or package RoCo and the 19/21 picks to another team for higher picks (like the Warriors 7/14 picks). One of the biggest things is that it would make us younger and give us more cap space/flexibility going forward. This is not a retool for this year. Not with the draft picks. It gives us a lot of pieces to work with going forward. It's a rebuild.
that Olshey still has the GM job already speaks volumes about ownership priorities. Hint: nobody in Seattle is emotionally invested in the Blazers as a team or as a contender. It's just a money machine to the Vulcans
I will say this, I love Dame, he is my favorite Blazer of all time, but we got screwed over the last time we dealt a superstar to his preferred destination out of loyalty. And what did we get out of it? A kick in the teeth when that douche wore the other teams jacket in his 50 greatest ceremony. Fuck that. I'm loyal to the Blazers. Not to any of the players. I'd like to see a championship in my lifetime. You take the best deal.
The fan in me agrees wholeheartedly. The guy whos worked with sports franchises on culture and cohesion can at least see an argument for keeping things relatively calm until the final decision has been made. I don't think it's a particularly *good* argument, but I can at least see a line of thinking where they're engaged enough to say "let's see how this plays out a little further before rocking the boat unnecessarily". But yes, in general, I agree that it seems that they're pretty unengaged.
I'll say this too... If Dame DOES play ball, gives Neil the offseason to improve the roster, recruits his ass off, and stays his normal high character, leader-self next year, then by all means, I think he will have earned the right to have some say in the final destination. I'm not trying to exile Dame here. I'm trying to insist that some amount of reasonability and understanding be baked into the process before just immediately demanding a divorce. Let's do couples counselling, let's try and make it work, and then get to the nuclear option.
Portland had 15, 20, & 26 in 2017 and ended up with Zach Collins and Caleb Swanigan that's my fuckup....I thought you were talking about Zach Collins....that at least was worth a LOL ***************************************************** IMO, the only way to maximize return from the nuclear option of Dame being traded is for the Blazers to immediately go full-rebuild. Trade CJ, Nurkic, RoCo and any other decent player over 24 for draft picks and expiring contracts. Build a treasure chest of future draft picks, then, suck as a team for 2-4 years and add high lottery picks to the collection and try and consolidate picks to higher picks but I sure as hell don't want Olshey in charge of any of that because I'm convinced he'd try and build a playoff team around his guy, CJ. That would be insufferable
Gotcha. Yeah, Zach would be worthy of an LOL. John, on the other hand... LOL. I would package those picks, along with another player to a team with salary cap issues that is rebuilding from scratch. I don't think the team that I outlined is a championship team, but I do think it is one piece away from being a contender. Having a roster with young talent and picks is how you get an all-star veteran who wants out of a bad situation in order to chase a ring. My thought was that you save enough money trading Dame that you free up cash to go after a guy like John Collins. Dame for Barrett/Quickley saves in the neighborhood of $20M. I'm not enough of a cap expert to know if they are in a position to use all of it.
People thought the Nets with Deron Williams, Brook, Pierce and Garnett would have great records for years. But the Celtics ended up with Tatum and Brown. The further out the draft picks are in return for Dame the better. However Randall and Dame could easily fail in a few years. Randall has one great year that's unclear if it's him or Tibbs, a repeat isn't guaranteed. Yes there's a risk picks don't net much. But it's a chance to build a contender and as the chance to build one with Dame here looks bleeker and bleeker that trade route could become the best option. If we could trade Dame for a younger Brown and Tatum, plus hopefully surround them with better starters than Boston did, a new Blazers roster could be a contender as they've never been with Dame.
If you keep those picks, then you trade assets for other picks. As you pointed out, if you trade assets to contenders, then those picks become late first rounders, and you can't bank on those picks turning into cornerstone players. I mean, Jokic was a second rounder. Giannis and Kawhi were both 15th picks. Gobert was a late 1st rounder. There are plenty of All-NBA players out there who are superstars that were not lottery picks. But we would have to draft projects and suck for a few years.
